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Spring Nature Walk

Quick! Open the window......Spring is knocking! Can you hear it? Smell it? Feel it?

Boots-clad, the girls are happily digging outside in the sunshine. Diaper-clad, Baby Boy screams instructions at them from the back door. Jammies-clad, I sit inside with the flu, bed-resting and tea-drinking and window-watching. This house is ready for spring!

Easter weekend, we had a few chilly sneak-peek days of Spring at Grandma and Grandpa Wolf's in Cincinnati. So we took our first spring nature walk of the year.

Grandma's garden shoes, ready for a busy season of coaxing beauty

New light and shadows

Swinging feet of happy mama with kid heart

Buds ready to burst into colorful spring

Looking, noticing signs of spring (excuse the pj's, please)

Wind and wood and setting sun

A ride in Grandpa's tractor to end a beautiful day...

A word about nature walks:

We started this tradition in Alabama when the kids were very small. We downloaded Tanglewood Education's Nature Notebook and put it in a 3-ring binder (plain paper works just as well). Kayla recently took this to school for show-and-tell. It's full of memories, leaves and drawings from our time in Alabama.

We usually just take a short walk around our yard, or wherever we might happen to be. It's amazing the things you notice when you just pay attention to the signs of the season around you. One time we discovered a caterpillar on a flower, took it home, and got to watch the whole cacoon/butterfly process. On this recent nature walk in Cincinnati, I realized how much had really sunk in on those walks. Mom has a small magnolia tree in her garden. I found Kayla standing alone, gazing at it. I asked her what it reminded her of. "Home" she said quietly. There was a humongous magnolia tree in the woods where we took our nature walks. It was a strong and vivid memory for her. There was also a cool chicken that lived in those woods we liked to chase.

These walks are not something we do on a regular basis or get in bondage to. We just do it when the fancy strikes. It's a great way to get the wiggles out when everyone is cranky from being together inside. And it fosters the skill of observation.

Comments

Ok, it's me again. I was looking at your links and noticed my niece's blog. Heather(Bryan)married my nephew Phillip Dickinson. Then to top it off you have a link to the Lavy's too!!! I just found out that Beth (Lavy) Dickinson is about to bless us with a new great niece or nephew too!! Heather and Beth's mother-in-law (Mom D) is my husband's oldest sister, you may know her and her husband Bud.

What a small world:)BlessingsLibbyPS All us mommy types love your modest streaker. :)

It is a small world. I am becoming more and more convinced (especially after my trip to Hobe Sound) that we're ALL related some way or another. (In Kentucky I think they call that inbred.)

Sherri and I had to smile together when your husband shared his (wonderful & insightful) comment in Sunday School. He sounds SO much like Mom D! I went to school with Michael and my husband was assistant pastor in Franklin, Ohio (Lavy-ville). But I'm only a friend - no relation here!